1 man + 4 women camping trip = Human mule

July 8th, 2010: My friend and I all made it back from the backcountry at Lake Churup, unscathed from our one night trip…packing for what seemed a 1 week expedition. I went with my 4 women friends who all but one have never been backcountry camping. They all came to the hostel dining area with itsee bitsee teeny weenie backpacks when it was time to distribute the weight. This obviously made me the human mule since I had the largest backpack.

I rarely go backcountry camping with anyone besides myself since it is so difficult to round up people who are willing to do it – so this was a treat to go with such a large group of women who were all positive about the limited luxury’s from going to the toilet on the hillside, too filling up their water bottles from suicidal insect filled lake

In the evening, my friends made a fire to boil our massive amounts of ramon noodles with the assistance of my portable compact tree-like notebook and a lighter. During the slow process of building a fire, I became more appreciative of my camping stove which makes life so much more easier. These are one of those luxuries you don’t appreciate until you are laying on the ground blowing air into a fire, taking some big hits of campfire smoke every few breaths as I was effectively charring my lungs for some future High School science class jar.

For everyone who knows me…I had no part in the managing of the fire except to randomly poke sticks into it, as I poorly listened to the commander of the fire and unintentionally destroyed it as I tried to make it larger when nobody was looking - since deep inside there is a controllable little pyromaniac in me.

The evening was beautiful when the stars decided to expose themselves as they were so plentiful and seemed to overpower our fire at times as we all pleasantly sat around the campfire taking in the warmth.

When heading back from 1 night of camping, we needed to avoid the park ranger who we lied to at the entrance, saying we were just going up for the day as I passed him with 4 sleeping pads strapped to the outside of my pack in addition to the exposed sleeping bags of my friends with their childlike size flimsy school packs. When the park ranger saw my stuff, he stopped us and said we didn’t have to carry our gear up and could leave it at this local’s house. He was told we wanted to be comfortable once we reach the top. Hmm, anyone with an IQ of 10.43448 would have known we were going to camp at the top.

There was a reason for this lack of truth besides being a group of compulsive liars. If the truth was told we would have had to pay the $23USD entrance fee for each person instead of the $1.75USD – a lot of money for my 3 Peruvian friends – including myself.
Taking a shortcut down the mountain through the marsh and through the grassy countryside, we escaped the grips of the park ranger making it to safety. Lying on the roadside, relaxing we waited and waited and waited for a local van/bus as the sun began to bake us a nice golden brown or red. Seeing some mules coming along the road, we ended up hiring them to take our baggage to the next town for about $0.30USD as we cut through the tiny towns on the mule paths. Our packs didn’t stay on very well on these animals as they would fall off, scaring them as they would perform mini sprints dragging the packs tied by ropes down and off the road. It was more of a laugh and an efficient way to prematurely wear out our packs rather than making it easier for us.

Now back in Huaraz, I am currently in the process of taking off again to the mountains for 4 days to do the Santa Cruz trek. This time I will be with an organized tour, with myself carrying zero equipment. It should be easier on the body, though it will have a different feel being with other customers rather than friends, but still good times.